steve brown is there live. steve, what has the epa done to deserve such a bad reputation in part of ohio? >> reporter: well the first thing we need to point out about eastern ohio it is a swinging type of area. it supported democrats and republican candidates. a lot of ticket splitters out there. it used to be home of a awful lot of manufacturing jobs. a lot of those have disappeared. for blue-collar folks some of the best jobs out there involving mining coal, working for a coal mine. the problem is, that the universal perception, both democrat-ic leaning and republican-leaning eastern ohioians, the epa has made those jobs more scarce. >> the epa is a dirty word out here? >> yes, sir. >> reporter: why is that? >> we've got oil and gas on its way in. we have coal mines. they say it is dirty coal. power plants are shutting down left and right. because of epa. yes, that's not a good word out here. >> reporter: the union, the united mine workers of america, which endorsed barack obama in 2008, put him on the cover